INTUITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

The importance of intuition became clearly recognized from the research by physics scientists in the 20th century particularly Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr…they were able to see the limitations of logical thinking and moved into the extraordinary potentials of intuitive perception…as yet, the psychological sciences have not made significant advances in understanding the role of intuition in the human personality.

Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his theory of “flow” has made an important contributions in this direction…however the role of intuition has not been fully explored…it appears intuition is not considered a subject appropriate for scientific investigation…perhaps the scientist who had the deepest understanding of intuition is Albert Einstein who I use as a frequent reference.

Our intuitive awareness is largely covered up by social conditioning which is concerned with developing a personality that meets social expectations…but intuitive feelings are our source of creativity, imagination, and insight…and without these qualities life can be a burdensome experience.

Intuition, for example, can be the source of an experience in which we become so involved in an activity, we totally forget our self and the sense of time…or an activity in which we spent a long time practicing and suddenly find we can perform the task effortlessly and with perfection…we can all remember struggling with a problem over a period of time only to find the answer in a moment of insight.

Perhaps the most important quality of intuition is its ability to be our “inner compass” by letting us know what is the “right path” for us…intuition when fully functioning allows us to live a contented life with the minimum expectations and disappointments.